Saturday, December 22, 2012

If you’re a dork, like me, you could win a bar bet by asking
a Flying Dutchmen fan to identify the game against Wright State in which the
Raiders led wire-to-wire.

Of course, there’s only a handful of other Hofstra fans, and
none of them are nearly as dorky as me, so knowing the Dutchmen trailed from
start to finish in last Saturday’s 63-57 loss to Wright State—and not in the
82-56 thrashing they endured in a Bracket Buster in February 2011—isn’t likely
to benefit you at all. Sorry.

Still, this one was a little better than the first meeting
between the teams, whatever that is worth, and when we sit down in March and
look back at this, uhh, interesting season, we’ll certainly count this one as
yet another “L” that probably would have been a “W” had four knuckleheads not
gotten arrested. Perhaps by then I’ll be less bitter and no longer
passive-aggressively referencing the fraudulent foursome without actually
naming them. Doubtful. Anyway.

1.) The Dutchmen’s narrow margin for error was on display
yet again against Wright State, which took advantage of early sloppiness by
Hofstra to race out to a 12-2 lead barely three minutes into the game. The
Dutchmen committed five turnovers and missed their first four field goals
before Stephen Nwaukoni’s layup with 15:13 left in the first half. The Raiders
extended the lead to 14 with 7:33 remaining, and while the Dutchmen mounted an
11-1 run immediately thereafter and got within a possession three times in the
second half, they never got the equalizer. The Dutchmen have fallen behind by a
double-digit margin in the first half in six of their eight losses.

“Turnovers—we just get down quick because we turn the ball
over two or three times to start the game,” Mo Cassara said. “We’ve done that
repeatedly here and it’s just putting us behind in a tough spot, so we’ve got
to really look at that and try to find a way to get around that. Obviously it’s
been a big, big issue for us.”

2.) Another big issue for the Dutchmen: Their poor shooting.
The Dutchmen shot just 36 percent (18-of-50), but the reality was worse: Jordan
Allen and Stephen Nwaukoni combined to shoot 9-of-13 from the field, which
meant the rest of their teammates were a ghastly 9-of-37. In three home games
since the arrests, the Dutchmen are shooting just 31.4 percent (49-of-156).

Not surprisingly, the Dutchmen struggled badly from beyond
the arc: They shot 5-of-22 from 3-point land, including a combined 1-of-10 by
Matt Grogan and Stevie Mejia, and are shooting 26.9 percent on 3-pointers
(14-of-52) in the last three home games.

“You look at the stat sheet: 1-for-7, 1-for-8, 3-for-12, we
had a lot of great opportunities,” Cassara said. “Two or three of those
3-pointers go in, it’s a different game. Matty hits one, Stevie hits one,
different game. And that’s our margin: [It’s] just very slim.”

3.) Just as they did to Charles Jenkins in February 2011,
Wright State did a tremendous job of shutting down the Dutchmen’s best
offensive threat. A week after he scorched Long Island University for 29
points, Taran Buie was 3-of-12 from the field and had just 11 points. Veterans
Mejia (1-of-8, six points), David Imes (2-of-6, six points, five turnovers) and
Moussa Kone (2-of-4, four points) could not pick up the slack, so Cassara
surely spent time this week figuring out a way to get others involved when Buie
is cold and/or contained.

“Offensive execution—that’s what I think we need to work on
a lot,” Mejia said. “We need to do better at it. Knowing each other, knowing
where guys like the ball, [where] guys like to shoot.”

4.) There were some developments in that area, particularly
with Mejia and Allen. Four of Mejia’s career-high eight assists were to Allen,
who set career highs himself with 13 points and seven rebounds in 29 minutes. He’s
set a career-high in minutes played in each of his last four games.

“I was just moving around on the court just finding
different ways to be effective,” Allen said. “I credit [Mejia] for getting me
the ball and finding me and making plays.”

Mejia also committed just two turnovers, the ninth time in
11 games he’s turned the ball over three times or less.

5.) Nwaukoni had another strong game on both ends of the
floor as he recorded the third double-double of his career with 12 points and
11 rebounds. He has at least seven rebounds in each of the last six games in
which he has played, a pretty impressive streak considering he’s coming off the
bench and is averaging just shy of 24 minutes per game in this stretch.

Nwaukoni has been doubly valuable given the recent struggles
of Imes and Kone, who are averaging just 26.5 and 18.3 minutes per game,
respectively, since the arrests. With Daquan Brown scheduled to become eligible
Saturday against Tulane, the Dutchmen might actually have some depth to work
with down low.